973.7L63 
B4H97e 
COD.  3 


TOIIS0N,  A.  P. 
1HEMNICNWH 


HINGED 


(/rrn 


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I  B  RAFLY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 
Of    ILLINOIS 


cop*  3 


IIMIHHS  HISTORICAL  SURVEY 


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THE  EVENT  ON  WHICH  THE 
GREAT  CIVIL  WAR  HINGED 

AN  UNWRITTEN  CHAPTER 
Relating  to  Abraham  Lincoln  and  Jesus  Christ- 

BY  A,  P.  HUTCHISON 


"There  shall  come  a  star  out  of  Jacob  and  a  scepter 
shall  rise  out  of  Israel  and  shall  smite  the  corners 
of  Moab  and  destroy  all  the  children  of  Sheth." 

PRICE  1O  CENTS 


To  my  wife  who  is  "passing  under  the  rod" 
whose  weary  feet  can  no  longer  run  on  errands 
for  her  Lord  and  King,  whose  willing  hands 
can  no  longer  minister  to  Him  and  His,  and 
whose  ready  tongue  can  no  longer  speak  or 
plead  for  His  crown  right;  THE  UNWRITTEN 
CHAPTER  is  affectionately  dedicated. 


RELATING  TO 

Abraham  Lincoln  and  Jesus  Christ,  or  the 

Event  on  Whtch  the  Great  Civil 

War  Hinged. 


CHAPTER  I. 

A  NEW  MOULDED  NATION. 

5    ± 

A  Corn  of  Wheat  Which  Fell  Into  the  Ground  and  Died. 

<?  tr 

- 

In  the  American  Conflict,  Horace  Greeley  says.: 

"Perhaps  the  very  darkest  days  that  the  Republic  ever 
saw,  were  the  ten  which  just  preceded  the  4th  of  July, 
1863;  when  our  oft-beaten  Army  was  moving  northward 
t-^        to  cover  Washington  and  Baltimore." 

And  surely  the  Republic  never  saw  brighter  days 
than  the  days  which  succeeded  those  ten,  beginning 
with  our  87th  Independence  Day.  In  three  brief 
days  the  whole  aspect  of  our  struggle  for  the  Union 
had  changed. 

Were  you  asked,  on  what  did  the  Great  Civil  War 

hinge,  what  would  you  say?  Would  you  say  as  a 

'  )  college   professor   deep   learned   in  the   Scriptures 

said?   "I  always  supposed  that  the  turning  point  of 

•*   the  war  was     the     Emancipation     Proclamation." 

o 


PAGE   TWO 


Would  you  say  with  George  R.  Wendling  that  the 
whole  war  hinged  on  Stonewall  Jackson?  In  his 
lecture  on  that  remarkable  character,  Mr.  Wendling 
argues, — that  there  were  two  distinct  civilizations 
in  the  American  nation ; — that  these  sprung  from  the 
Puritan  and  Cavalier; — that  they  could  not  exist 
side  by  side; — that  the  Civil  War  was  a  crucible  in 
which  these  elements  were  fused,  that  they  might  be 
recast  into  a  better  civilization; — that  Stonewall 
Jackson  was  the  genius  who  presided  over  the  for- 
tunes of  the  war  until  the  elements  were  fused; — 
that  when  the  elements  were  fused.  Jackson,  in  the 
Providence  of  God,  was  removed,  the  tide  of  war 
turned,  disunion  died,  and  "The  Nation  under  God 
had  a  new  birth  of  freedom."  With  Wendling  the 
Civil  War  hinged  on  Stonewall  Jackson.  You  will 
recall  Whittier's  lines : — 

"We  wait  beneath  the  furnace  blast, 

The  pangs  of  transformation, 

Not  painlessly  doth  God  recast 

And  mould  anew  the  Nation." 

Or  yet  again  would  you  say,  as  is  often  averfed 
in  history,  that  the  turning  point  of  the  Great  Civil 
War  was  the  Battle  of  Gettysburg?  Or  as  was 
asserted,  without  regard  to  history,  by  an  unctuous 
preacher  who  said  in  a  burst  of  eloquence,  "The 
Battle  of  Gettysburg  was  the  turning  point  in  the 
Great  Rebellion.  When  General  Grant  was  leading 
the  Union  Army  to  the  bloody  field,  President  Lin- 
coln registered  a  solemn  vow  that  if  God  would 
give  victory  to  the  Union  arms,  he  would  at  once 
issue  the  Emancipation  Proclamation,  and  set  every 
bondman  in  the  Country  free.  And  when  Sheridan 
with  a  terrible  oath  leaped  his  horse  over  the 
Bloody  Angle  the  shackles  fell  from  fourteen  mil- 
lion slaves." 


PAGE    THBEE 




THE  OBJECT  OF  THIS  MANUAL. 

Our  object  in  writing  this  little  manual  is  to  show 
that  the  tide  in  our  Great  Civil  War  hinged,  not  on 
the  Emancipation  Proclamation,  not  on  the  death 
of  General  Jackson,  not  on  the  Battle  of  Gettysburg, 
but  upon  an  appeal  for  succor  which  was  made  to 
Almighty  God  through  Jesus  Christ  when  the  nation 
was  ready  to  perish ;  an  appeal  in  which  the  Senate 
and  Abraham  Lincoln  and  the  loyal  people  of  the 
North  united.  We  do  not  hesitate  to  say,  that  upon 
that  National  Confession  of  Almighty  God  and  of 
his  Son,  the  Prince  and  Mediator,  the  very  existence 
of  our  Republic  in  that  dark  hour  was  suspended. 
It  is  written,  "Except  a  corn  of  wheat  fall  into  the 
ground  and  die,  it  abideth  alone."  Joseph,  envied 
and  hated,  was  sold  to  the  Ishmaelites  and  drifted 
for  years  from  sight,  but  he  reappeared  in  the  second 
chariot  of  the  Egyptian  Empire.  Elijah  P.  Lovejoy 
lay  for  many  years  in  a  neglected  grave,  but  the  State 
of  Illinois  has  built  for  him  one  of  her  costliest 
monuments.  When  John  Brown  was  hanged  on 
December  2nd,  1859,  the  American  people  little 
dreamed  that  he  was  born  unto  immortality.  It 
was  more  than  a  score  of  years  after.the  dedication 
of  the  Cemetery  at  Gettysburg  before  the  people 
came  to  realize  that  Lincoln's  address  at  the  dedica- 
tion was  a  classic.  Our  unwritten  chapter  relating 
to  Abraham  Lincoln  and  Jesus  Christ  was  a  corn 
of  wheat,  which  fell  into  the  ground  and  died.  The 
hour  for  its  new  life  is  come.  The  Unwritten  Chap- 
ter has  to  do  with  the  National  Confession  of  Christ 
the  Mediator,  made  by  a  resolution  of  the  United 
States  Senate,  on  March  2nd,  1863;  in  which  Presi- 
dent Lincoln  concurred  in  his  fast  day  proclamation 
of  March  30th ;  and  in  which  the  loyal  people  joined 


PAGE     FOUR 


in  celebrating  a  day  of  fasting  and  prayer  on  April 
30th.  This  unwritten  chapter  makes  plain  that 
there  is  a  name  which  must  be  above  every  name. 
It  gives  the  key  to  Lincoln's  immortality.  It  tells 
the  story  of  how  our  Nation  was  saved  in  the  hour 
of  her  extremity  by  the  intervention  of  the  God  of 
Hosts,  who  had  been  sought  in  His  appointed  way, 
through  Jesus  Christ.  The  lesson  of  the  Unwritten 
Chapter  is  that  there  never  can  be  any  solution  of 
the  Drink  Problem  until  Our  Lord  and  King  be 
duly  recognized. 

A  VISAGE  MARRED. 

The  Historian  writes  from  the  human  viewpoint. 
Politics  is  materialistic.  History  is  forever  secular. 
Scores  of  histories  have  been  written  which  cover 
more  or  less  fully  the  life  of  Abraham  Lincoln,  yet 
no  one  among  them  all  gives  the  facts  of  the  Un- 
written Chapter.  The  historians  have  left  the  facts 
to  the  prophets  and  the  seers.  But  the  prophets  of 
this  generation  have  not  been  see-ers. 

Nations,  like  men,  have  their  dark  hours;  hours 
of  peril  and  perplexity ;  hours  of  extremity  and  woe. 
Such  an  hour  was  that  of  the  Kingdom  of  Judah 
when  Tartan  qnd  Rabsaris  and  Rabshakeh  came  to 
Jerusalem  from  Sennacherib  with  an  insolent  demand 
for  the  surrender  of  the  Capitol.  In  the  presence  of 
the  conquerer  and  his  veteran  host,  Hezekiah  was 
as  helpless  as  an  infant.  At  such  an  hour  he  put  on 
sackcloth  and  went  up  to  the  House  of  the  Lord 
and  spread  the  letter  of  the  Conquerer  before  Jeho- 
vah and  shrank  for  refuge  into  the  shadow  of  Him 
who  dwelt  between  the  Cherubims.  The  shelter  of 
Shechinah  was  the  undoing  of  Sennacherib. 

Such  an  hour  of  extremity  and  darkness  and  woe 
came  to  the  American  Republic  and  its  President 


PAGE     FIVE 


during  the  months  of  increasing  gloom  which  span- 
ned the  period  from  the  mid-year  of  '62  to  Indepen- 
dence Day,  1863.  Few  men  of  to-day  realize  how 
near,  in  the  first  fateful  months  of  '6*3,  our  beloved 
Nation  came  to  her  destruction.  In  the  biography 
of  Judge  James  Harlan,  who  presented  the  resolu- 
tion in  the  Senate  with  which  our  Unwritten  Chapter 
has  to  do,  there  is  a  chapter  on,  "The  Years  of 
Gloom."  Eugene  Chafin,  after  a  title  of  him  who, 
"Tasted  death  for  every  man,"  has  called  Abraham 
Lincoln,  the  "Man  of  Sorrows."  And  perhaps  aside 
from  Him  "Who  bore  our  griefs  and  carried  our 
sorrows,"  no  man  in  the  world's  eventful  history  has 
borne  the  title  so  fittingly.  Some  men  are  men  of 
talent.  Some  have  magnetic  power.  Some  are 
gifted  with  rare  genius.  But  Lincoln  was  the  man 
of  heart.  He  bore  the  grief  of  his  Nation,  and  like 
his  Lord,  "His  visage  was  so  marred  more  than 
any  man,"  The  Unwritten  Chapter  will  reveal 
how  Abraham  Lincoln  and  his  counsellors,  in  the 
darkest  hour  our  country  ever  knew,  shrank  like 
Hezekiah  the  King,  and  Isaiah  the  Son  of  Amoz  and 
Shebna  the  Scribe  into  the  shadow  of  the  God  of 
all  the  Earth. 


CHAPTER  II. 

THE  OMINOUS  OPENING 

or 
A  Brief  Annal  of  the  First  Months  of  the  War. 


The  annal  of  these  first  months  of  the  war  are 
common  history.  They  pave  the  way  to  the  Unwritten 
Chapter.  When  Abraham  Lincoln  took  his  seat  on 
March  4th,  '61,  our  country  was  rent  into  three 


PAGE      SIX 

great  factions.  The  loyal  people  had  elected  Mr. 
Lincoln  president.  A  great  faction  was  opposed  to 
his  administration.  A  third  great  faction  was  seced- 
ing from  the  Union  and  taking  up  arms  against  it. 
The  second  of  these  factions  lent  not  a  little  com- 
fort to  the  elements  in  rebellion.  The  task  of 
Abraham  Lincoln  was  to  wage  a  great  war  with 
enemies  in  front  and  with  bitter  opponents  in  his 
rear.  At  the  break  of  day  on  April  12th,  1861, 
Fort  Sumter  was  fired  on.  In  July,  '61,  the  real 
war  opened. 

On  July  16th,  General  McDowell  with  29,000 
men,  moved  out  from  Washington.  The  Army 
leasurely  advanced.  The  enemy  retired.  At  length 
the  Army  of  Beauregard  was  found,  some  thirty 
miles  or  more  southwest  of  Washington,  posted  on 
the  wooded  hills  of  Bull  Run — fateful  name. — 
three  miles  from  Centerville.  On  Lord's  Day  morn- 
ing, July  21,  the  Army  in  three  divisions  moved 
upon  the  foe.  Up  to  this  hour,  the  North  would  not 
believe  that  a  great  civil  war  was  on.  The  march 
from  Washington  had  been  like  a  holiday.  A  cloud 
of  visitors  on  foot,  in  saddle  or  in  carriage  followed 
the  army,  as  to  a  picnic  jaunt,  eager  to  see  a  battle. 
For  once  curiosity  had  enough.  From  ten  till  three, 
in  summer  heat  and  stifling  battle  smoke,  the  bat- 
tle raged.  For  one  brief  hour  the  Union  men  were 
victors.  But  Jackson  was  there,  who  sprung  into 
fame  that  day  'as  "Stonewall  Jackson."  And  fresh 
troops  of  Johnson  came  up  like  a  whirlwind  and 
swept  the  field.  Our  tired  forces  were  routed,  and 
thrown  into  panic  and  rolled  back  like  a  mob  toward 
the  capital.  When  order  was  restored  the  roll  call 
told  of  2800  men  who  were  wounded  or  missing  or 
numbered  with  the  slain.  What  a  wail  of  sorrow 


PAGE      SEVEN 


swept  the  land !  The  Nation  had  been  rudely  awak- 
ened. And  now  amid  the  gloom  the  spectre  of  a 
dreadful  war  appeared.  For  more  than  ten  score 
years  we  had  upheld  the  crime  of  Slavery.  The 
Nation  had  transgressed.  With  her  first  born  she 
now  must  make  atonement.  For  every  drop  of 
blood  drawn  by  the  lash,  and  for  every  bead  of 
sweat  of  unrequited  toil,  we  were  now  to  pay  the 
utmost  farthing.  The  dream  of  easy  peace  had 
faded. 


THE  PENINSULAR  CAMPAIGN. 

For  nine  long  months  enlistments  and  organiza- 
tions and  drill  dragged  on  and  on.  McClelland  was 
a  lion  in  his  camp.  In  the  field  he  was  less  terrible. 
Now  it  is  April  '62.  With  his  last  excuse  for  in- 
action exhausted  the  Army  of  the  Potomac  moves. 
Sweeping  with  a  fleet  of  transports  down  the  Chesa- 
peake the  army  is  landed  upon  the  Peninsula.  With 
the  York  river  on  the  right,  the  James  upon  the 
left,  the  Army  creeps  timidly  toward  Richmond. 
Better  men  never  went  to  any  field,  but  there  were 
Quaker  guns  at  Yorktown,  and  with  McClelland, 
discretion  was  the  tetter  part  of  valor.  Johnson  was 
there  to  dispute  the  way  at  first  and  later  Lee  and 
Jackson.  And  there  was  fighting.  Williamsburg 
was  fought  and  Seven  Pines  and  Mechanicsville 
and  Gain's  Mill  and  Frazier  Farm  and  Savage 
Station  and  Malvern  Hill.  The  Army  has  swung 
round  and  back  to  Harrison's  Landing,  nearly  where 
it  started.  The  Army  has  lost  in  killed  and  wound- 
ed and  missing,  not  far  from  20,000  men.  It  has  lost 
52  cannons.  It  has  lost  35,000  stand  of  arms  Amid 
the  July  heat  nearly  17,000  soldiers  are  burning 
with  fevers  in  the  army  hospitals.  About  4,000 
men  are  absent  without  leave.  Our  grand  army  on 


PAGE     EIGHT 


which  we  so  counted  is  a  baffled,  decimated  mob  of 
sun-browned  men,  weary,  disheartened  and  battle- 
worn.  Thrice  ten  thousand  homes  are  in  suspense 
and  sorrow.  The  public  debt  is  mounting  up  and 
up.  The  gloom  has  deepened. 

POPE  COMES  FROM  THE  WEST. 

General  Pope  had  some  repute  as  a  fighter.  Sum- 
moned from  the  West,  his  duty  was  to  cover  Wash- 
ington and  to  support  McClelland.  Marching  to 
the  South  from  Washington,  70,000  men  were  con- 
centrated under  his  command.  Lee  in  sublime  con- 
tempt of  McClelland,  left  the  Peninsula  to  meet  this 
new  army.  Pope  did  some  plucky  fighting  between 
the  Rappahannock  and  the  Rapidan,  and  then  with- 
drew behind  the  former  river.  Stonewall  Jackson 
was  there.  He  had  25,000  men.  Now  he  executes 
one  of  those  swift  marches,  and  launches  one  of 
those  dread  blows  which  made  him  famous.  Alex- 
ander the  Great,  from  his  swift  marches  and  fierce 
assaults,  is  represented  in  the  symbols  of  Daniel's 
dream,  as  a  leopard  with  four  wings. 
But  Alexander  never  had  an  army  that 
could  move  so  swift  or  strike  so  hard  as  that  of 
Stonewall  Jackson.  Sweeping  up  the  Rappahannock, 
till  the  Bull  Run  mountains  are  between  him  and 
Pope,  he  turns  to  the  north  and  screened  from  view 
by  the  mountains,  passed  Pope's  army,  charged  like 
a  tornado  through  Thoroughfare  Gap  upon  Pope's 
rear,  captured  his  base  of  supplies ;  and  alas  for  the 
havoc  he  wrought  at  Bristow  Station  and  Manassas 
Junction!  The  very  flames  were  surfeited  and 
slept  in  smouldering  piles  of  supplies  and  muni- 
tions of  war.  What  a  revel  had  Jackson's  men 
among  the  spoils !  And  when  Pope's  fretted  army 
turned  about  it  found  Lee  and  Longstreet  in  its 


PAGE      NINE 


rear.  And  there  on  August  29th  and  30th,  '62,  we 
met  another  Waterloo.  It  was  our  second  battle  of 
Bull  Run.  The  next  day,  September  1st,  Pope  had 
to  fight  the  battle  of  Chantilly,  amid  a  raging  thun- 
derstorm to  open  the  way  for  his  retreat  to  Wash- 
ington, only  20  miles  away.  And  there  amid  the 
battle  and  the  storm  Phil  Kearney,  who  had  lost 
an  arm  in  Mexico  12  years  before,  and  Isaac  Stev- 
ens, were  numbered  with  our  heroic  dead. 

It  was  in  this  campaign  that  Stuart  crossed  the 
Rappahannock  at  Waterloo,  and  on  a  rainy  night 
with  1500  mounted  men  stole  upon  Pope's  head- 
quarters; captured  his  Quartermaster,  his  tent  and 
letters  and  uniform.  With  these  the  next  day  he 
turned  Pope's  slogan,  "On  to  Richmond,"  into  cruel 
ridicule.  His  men  took  a  burly  negro.  They  decked 
him  in  Popes's  uniform.  They  put  a  placard  on  his 
back,  "On  to  Richmond,"  and  sent  him  into  the 
Union  camp.  Had  Bonaparte  been  in  McClelland' s 
saddle,  when  Lee  left  Richmond  to  meet  Pope  on 
the  Rapidan,  he  would  have  taken  Richmond,  chased 
after  Lee  and  ground  him  to  powder  between  the 
upper  and  nether  millstones  on  the  Rapidan.  But 
McClelland  was  no  Bonaparte.  The  campaign  of 
Pope  in"  seven  brief  weeks  of  summer  had  cost  us 
millions  in  supplies  and  mules  and  horses  and  muni- 
tions of  war.  Twenty  thousand  rifles  were  taken, 
and  guns,  a  staggering  number.  Our  killed  and 
wounded  and  missing  numbered  14,500,  and  many 
thousands  more  straggled  from  the  army  that  never 
returned.  And  the  public  debt  mounted  up  and  up. 
The  homes  which  were  bowed  in  sorrow  multiplied 
and  denser  settled  the  gloom. 

LEE  DREAMED  A  DREAM. 

It  is  not  strange  that  unvarying  success  should 


PAGE     TEN 


set  Lee  to  dreaming  dreams.  He  will  invade 
Maryland.  A  victory  on  her  soil  will  draw  her  into 
secession.  It  might  open  the  way  to  the  capture 
of  Baltimore  or  Washington.  A  big  victory  would 
impel  a  recognition  of  the  Confederacy.  Recogni- 
tion would  lift  the  embargo  on  Southern  ports.  It 
would  stiffen  the  Southern  credit.  A  big  stake 
loomed  up  in  Lee's  dream.  If  any  man  on  earth 
could  make  a  dream  come  true  that  man  was  Lee. 
Swift  as  an  avalanche  he  hurled  his  left,  under 
Jackson,  upon  Harper's  Ferry.  Jackson  knew  how 
to  deal  a  blow.  On  September  1 5th,  '62,  the  strong- 
hold fell.  Standards  were  captured  and  15,000  rifles. 
Seventy-three  pieces  of  artillery  were  taken,  and 
12,500  prisoners  of  war,  and  all  with  little  loss. 
^With  Jackson  time  was  everything  and  now  he  hur- 
ries away  to  join  Lee,  who  has  gone  on  to  Antietam. 
In  order  to  hold  McClelland  off,  Lee  worked  a 
brilliant  bluff,  and  so  gained  time  till  Jackson  came. 
Late  in  the  afternoon  of  September  16th,  the  battle 
opened  with  fierce  determination.  It  raged  next 
clay.  Antietam  was  one  of  the  bloodiest  battles  of 
the  war.  A  victory  was  claimed  by  both  sides.  We 
claimed  it  because  we  held  the  field,  because  Lee  had 
to  withdraw  beyond  the  Potomac,  and  because  he 
failed  of  his  great  stake.  The  Rebels  claimed  An- 
tietam because  with  an  army  a  third  smaller  than 
our  own  they  gave  us  an  even  battle,  because  they 
had  outpointed  us  in  strategy  and  because  their 
losses  in  the  Maryland  campaign  were  not  half  so 
great  as  ours.  As  if  to  prove  that  Antietam  was  not 
a  Union  victory,  Lee  23  days  later  ordered  Stuart 
back  with  1800  saddles  across  the  Potomac.  This 
bold  commander  raided  into  Pennsylvania,  captur- 
ed and  paroled  scores  of  sick  and  wounded  prison- 


PAGE     ELEVEN 


ers,  destroyed  5000  rifles,  burned  trains,  and  depots 
of  supplies,  and  rode  away  leading  hundreds  of 
horses,  driving  herds  of  army  cattle,  circling  Mc- 
Clelland's  arm}-,  and  recrossing  the  Potomac  with- 
out one  missing  man.  The  Maryland  campaign  did 
little  to  brighten  our  prospects  in  the  war.  More 
than  2000  were  killed  at  Antietam.  We  had  9,500 
wounded.  A  thousand  men  and  more  were  missing. 
We  had  lost  in  the  campaign  12,500  prisoners  of 
war.  What  these  figures  meant  to  the  homes  of  the 

loyal  North  cannot  be  told. 

"Oh  war,  cruel  war,  thou  dost  pierce  the  heart  with  un- 
told sorrows,  as  well  as  thy  bleeding  victims  with  death!" 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  EMANCIPATION    PROCLAMATION— A    BLOW 
DEALT    AS    A    MEASURE    OF    WAR. 


Abraham  Lincoln  was  not  an  Abolitionist.  Under 
date  of  August  19,  1862,  Horace  Greeley  addressed 
an  open  letter  to  the  President  in  the  New  York 
Tribune.  The  caption  of  the  letter  was,  "The  Pray- 
er of  Twenty  Millions."  To  this  letter  Mr.  Lin- 
coln replied  by  telegraph,  on  August  22.  In  this 
message  he  said : — 

"My  paramount  object  is  to  save  the  Union,  and  not 
either  to  save  or  to  destroy  slavery."  If  I  could  save 
the  Union  without  freeing  any  slaves,  I  would  do  it.  And 
if  I  could  do  it  by  freeing  some  and  leaving  others  alone, 
I  would  also  do  that." 

But  just  one  month  after  these  words  sped  the 
wire  the  Emancipation  Proclamation  was  made. 
The  Proclamation  did  not  put  slavery  in  the  cata- 
logue of  crimes,  nor  base  its  abolition  on  grounds  of 
righteousness.  It  was  not  to  take  effect  until  Jan- 
uary 1,  1863,  one  hundred  days  after  it  was  issued. 


It  was  not  to  apply  to  any  territory  not  in  rebellion 
on  that  date  against  the  Government  of  the  United 
States.  The  Proclamation  of  the  President  on 
January  1,  '63,  exempted  from  its  operation  the 
border  slave  States- — Delaware,  Maryland,  Ken- 
tucky, Tennessee  and  Missouri,  which  had  not 
seceded  from  the  Union.  It  did  not  apply  to  West 
Virginia,  which  had  seceded  from  Secession,  but 
had  not  been  admitted  to  the  Union.  There  were 
seven  counties  of  Virginia  and  the  cities  of  Nor- 
folk and  Portsmouth  and  sixteen  parishes  in 
Lousiana,  including  the  city  of  New  Orleans,  to 
which  Emancipation  did  not  apply.  When  Moses 
came  upon  the  ground  to  lead  Israel  out  of  bondage, 
he  said  to  Phahaoh,  "There  shall  not  a  hoof  be  left 
behind."  The  Emancipation  Proclamation  did  not 
so  deal  with  Pharaoh.  It  did  not  regard  the  Divine 
proscription  against  "Man-stealing,"  nor  deal  with 
slavery  as  a  sin  against  the  Almighty,  or  as  a  crime 
against  humanity.  It  therefore  gave  no  warrant 
upon  God's  promise,  nor  offered  any  ground  on 
which  to  appeal  for  Divine  succor. 

ABRAHAM  LINCOLN  DESERTED. 

In  the  fall  of  '6^  the  public  discontent  grew 
apace.  The  doubtful  successes  and  the  disastrous 
failures  of  the  army,  the  mounting  upward  of  the 
public  debt,  the  pressure  of  taxes,  the  impotency  of 
the  Government,  the  favor  of  foreign  powers  to- 
ward the  Confederacy,  and  the  multiplied  sorrows 
of  our  Northern  homes,  bred  a  state  of  public  mind 
that  was  ominous.  Treasonable  agitators  like  Val- 
andingham  and  Hendricks  and  Corning  and  a  cloud 
of  others,  censured  the  administration,  decried  the 
war  as  a  failure,  lent  courage  to  the  enemy,  spoke 
in  contempt  of  our  leaders,  jaundiced  the  public 


PAGE     THIRTEEN 


credit,  and  aroused  insistent  discontent.  Like  the 
roar  of  a  winter  storm  brewing  upon  the  mountains, 
was  the  disaffection  as  the  elections  of  1862  ap- 
proached. And  those  elections !  What  an  hour  for 
an  administration  travailing  in  pain  to  bring  forth 
a  new  Nation!  New  York  by  a  majority  of  nearly 
1 1,000  defeated  loyal  Governor  Morgan,  and  elected 
Horatio  Seymour.  New  Jersey  gave  Joel  Parker, 
a  copperhead,  a  majority  of  nearly  15,000  for  Gov- 
ernor, ancf  turned  down  the  patriot  Olden.  Penn- 
sylvania, despite  the  fact  that  Andrew  G.  Curtain, 
a  tower  of  strength  to  Lincoln,  sat  in  the  Govern- 
or's chair,  gave  the  opposition  candidate  a  majority 
of  3,500  votes.  Ohio  defeated  the  administration 
by  5,500  and  lent  endorsement  to  Valandingham. 
Indiana  cast  a  majority  of  nearly  10,000  votes 
against  Lincoln's  administration,  and  gave  Tom 
Hendricks  inner  joy.  Illinois,  the  President's  own 
State,  cast  16,500  votes  of  a  majority  against  her 
most  illustrious  son.  In  Michigan  and  Iowa  and 
Wisconsin  and  Minnesota  was  such  a  slump  in  the 
vote  cast  two  years  before  for  the  President  as 
voiced  a  pitiful  want  of  confidence.  Even  one  in  four 
of  the  soldiers  voting  in  the  field  voted  against  the 
administration.  The  ten  great  loyal  States  which 
had  rolled  up  a  majority  of  more  than  208,000  when 
Lincoln  was  made  President,  now  cast  a  majority 
of  nearly  36,000  against  him.  The  States  which 
two  years  before  sent  78  representatives  to  the  lower 
House  to  uphold  the  administration  to  37  against 
it,  now  send  only  57  to  uphold  the  President  as 
against  67  returned  against  him.  The  opponents  in 
his  rear  had  dealt  the  honest  President  a  harder 
blow  than  the  armed  foes  in  front.  The  clamor 
which  filled  the  land  against  "Shedding  priceless 


PAGE     FOURTEEN 


blood  for  worthless  niggers,"  had  done  its  work. 
The  policy  of  Lincoln  was  disapproved.  The 
Emancipation  Proclamation  was  repudiated.  On 
such  a  vote  an  English  premier  would  have  resign- 
ed on  election  night.  "Two  woes  are  past.  Behold 
another  cometh  quickly!" 

GRASPING   FOR   HELP. 

Not  yet  had  Abraham  Lincoln  and  his  advisors 
come  to  realize  that  the  Almighty  rules  in  the  af- 
fairs of  men  and  nations,  and  that  He  must  be 
sought  in  His  appointed  way.  Dazed  by  the  blow 
of  his  opponents,  the  President  reached  out  for 
help.  From  some  whither  must  come  some  strong 
hand  to  steady  the  trembling  pillars  of  the  Republic. 
Burnsides  was  big,  and  humble  and  brave  and  true 
as  he  was  big  in  body;  but  his  genius  was  not  to 
initiate  and  lead,  but  to  execute  commands.  He 
knew  his  limits.  His  self-distrust  was  the  augury 
of  his  defeat.  How  was  a  self-distrusting  man  to 
meet  Lee,  emboldened  by  victories,  behind  his  ram- 
parts on  the  Rappahannock  ?  But  Burnsides  must 
move.  His  was  "The  Mud  March"  to  Fredericks- 
burg.  On  December  13,  '62,  a  brave  and  desperate 
assault  was  made  upon  Lee's  strongholds,  which 
frowned  down  upon  the  Rappahannock  where  with 
onward  sweep  she  meets  the  tide.  But  the  army  that 
could  cross  the  deep  lying  river  under  those  ram- 
parts and  storm  and  take  them,  had  not  been  born. 
It  was  only  soldiers  of  Spartan  valor  who  stormed 
that  day  the  Stonewall  and  Marye's  Heights  and 
those  stern  river  bluffs.  And  O,  what  a  day  of 
slaughter!  Fifteen  thousand  wounded,  mangled, 
killed,  are  strewn  upon  those  hills.  Within  40  yards 
of  bristling  guns,  the  dead  are  piled.  Alas  for  the 
mothers  of  the  North  who  waited  for  tidings,  as 


PAGE     FIFTEEN 


the  mother  of  Sisera  waited  at  her  lattice!  Major 
(k-orge  L).  Bayard,  scarce  more  than  a  boy,  with 
leave  of  absence  to  be  wedded  at  the  Christmas 
lime,  fell  that  day.  And  alas  for  the  maidens  who 
waited  like  his,  for  lovers  who  were  never «to  re- 
turn! And  alas  for  Abraham  Lincoln,  when  the 
correspondent  of  the  London  Times  voiced  from 
l.ee's  headquarters  the  prejudice  of  his  Nation: 

"Fredericksburg,  a  memorable  day  for  the  future  histor- 
ian of  the  decline  and  fall  of  the  American  Republic!" 

Had  not  the  God  of  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  held  some 
higher  destiny  for  our  Nation,  the  blood  of  Fred- 
cricksburg  would  have  left  her  desolate.  Like  Judah 
in  He/.ekiah's  day,  she  was  left  now  without  any 
earthly  refuge. 

"The   tumult  and   the   shouting  dies, 
The  Captains  and  the   Kings  depart; — 
Still  stands  thine  ancient  sacrifice, — 
An  humble  and  a  contrite  heart, 
Lord  God  of  Hosts,  be  with  us  yet, 
Lest  we  forget — lest  we  forget!" 

Far-called   our  navies   melt  away, — 
On  dune  and  headland  sinks  the  fire, — 
Lo,  all  our  pomp  of  yesterday 
Is   one   with    Nineveh   and   Tyre! 
Judge  of  the  Nations,  spare  us  yet, 
Lest  we  forget — lest  we  forget!" 


CHAirrKk  IV. 

THE  MONTHS  OF  GLOOM. 


A  Darkness  That  Could  be  Felt. 

(  >n  September  13th.  'oft.  two  days  before  the  sur- 
render of  Harper's  Ferry,  ministers  of  Chicago 
visited  ihe  White  House  to  insist  upon  the  immediate 


PAGE     SIXTEEN 


emancipation  of  the  slaves.    To  these  ministers  the 
President  replied : — 

"I  do  not  want  to  issue  a  document  that  the  whole  world 
will  see  must  necessarily  be  inoperative,  like  the  Pope's 

bull  against  the  comet." 

• 

But  the  very  thing  had  happened  which  Abraham 
Lincoln  sought  to  avoid.  Emancipation  was  des- 
tined to  go  into  effect,  only  18  days  after  the  bloody 
disaster  of  Fredericksburg.  Well  might  the  Presi- 
dent have  taken  up  the  wail  of  Hezekiah  : — 

"This  day  is  a  day  of  trouble  and  of  rebuke  and  of 
blasphemy;  for  the  children  are  come  to  the  birth  and 
there  is  not  strength  to  bring  forth." 

Darker  days  have  seldom  brooded  over  any  land 
tfian  our  dark  days  of  '63.  The  Army  of  the  Po- 
tomac at  the  seat  of  war  had  met  many  and  grave 
disasters.  The  whole  land  was  burdened  with 
taxes,  stricken  with  untold  griefs,  and  harrowed  by 
sentiments  of  treason.  The  public  debt  had  mounted 
up  and  up  until  it  had  become  a  nightmare.  On  Feb- 
ruary 2nd,  '63,  the  public  credit  had  reached  the 
lowest  point  touched  that  year,  and  lower  than  any 
hitherto  in  the  history  of  the  Republic.  Many  regi- 
ments in  the  army  of  the  Potomac  had  not  received 
a  cent  of  pay  in  six  months.  Beaten  and  decimated 
and  penniless,  the  Army  of  the  Potomac  now  under 
Hooker,  had  lost  its  morale  and  200  men  were  de- 
serting every  day.  The  Confederate  press  vaunted 
the  prowess  of  the  Confederate  leaders,  was  exult- 
ant over  repeated  victories,  and  was  insistent  upon 
foreign  recognition.  The  spirit  of  the  Northern 
press  and  people  can  well  be  gauged  by  a  letter  of 
Horace  Greeley,  written  to  the  President  four  days 
after  the  battle  of  Gettysburg,  in  which  he  said: — 
"I  venture  to  remind  you  that  the  bleeding,  bankrupt, 
almost  dying  country  longs  for  peace." 


PAGE     SEVENTEEN 


THE  INTRIGUE  OF  NAPOLEON. 

The  repudiation  of  ten  loyal  States  was  ominous 
enough.  But  our  greatest  menace  in  those  dark 
hours  was  the  ambition  and  intrigue  of  Napoleon 
III  of  France.  The  Emperor  of  France  was  well 
gifted  with  the  ambitions  of  his  uncle,  the  great 
Napoleon.  Of  the  genius  of  the  latter  he  had  none. 
Napoleon  III  could  not  but  remember  that  60  years 
be  fore,  when  his  illustrious  uncle  was  at  war  with 
England,  Jefferson  and  Madison  had  dealt  him 
out  of  the  Louisana  Purchase,  a  territory  five  times 
as  large  as  the  French  Empire.  The  great  Napoleon 
had  a  dream  of  a  great  Latin  Empire  on  the  Amer- 
ican Continent.  Napoleon  III  revived  the  dream, 
and  thought  to  found  an  Empire  tributary  to  his 
own.  Mexico  as.  she  is  now,  was  rent  with  revo- 
lution. Our  hands  were  tied  by  Civil  war.  Na- 
poleon landed  an  army  at  Vera  Cruz.  William  H. 
Seward,  our  Secretary  of  State,  warned  the  Em- 
peror. The  warning  was  insolently  ignored.  Maxi- 
milian, Arch  Duke  of  Austra,  was  groomed  for 
the  throne  of  Mexico.  An  assembly  of  notables, 
seven  days  after  the  battle  of  Gettysburg,  tendered 
him  the  crown.  Napoleon  was  eager  to  interpose 
an  independent  Confederacy  between  the  American 
Republic  and  his  new  Empire.  The  fates  favored 
his  ambitions.  The  Confederacy  was  eager  for  his 
support.  Maximilian  was  of  the  House  of  Haps- 
burg,  which  invited  Spain's  good  will.  Napoleon 
had  strongly  supported  Pope  Pius  IX  against  the 
Republican  trend  of  Italy,  and  could  now  count  on 
his  support.  The  Emperor  could  pledge  to  safe- 
guard the  interests  of  the  English  in  Mexico.  And 
Gladstone  and  the  ruling  classes  of  Great  Britian 
were  in  heart  with  the  Confederacy.  The  lines  of 


PAGE     EIGHTEEN 


Napoleon's  schemes  were  deeply  laid  and  waited 
only  the  crowning  of  Maximillian.  The  peril  of  the 
American  Republic  was  imminent. 

The  wonder  is  that  Abraham  Lincoln  endured. 
With  treason  exultant ;  with  the  spirit  of  the  army 
broken ;  with  our  debt  towering  like  a  mountain  : 
with  our  credit  almost  prostrate;  with  his  adminis- 
tration deserted ;  with  the  powers  in  intrigue  against 
us ;  the  good  President's  face  took  a  cast  more  sad 
and  sallow,  and  his  shoulders  stooped  a  little  more. 
He  \vas  what  Charm  called  him  /'The  Man  of  Sor- 
rows," and  like  the  man  of  sorrows,  "His  visage 
was  so  marred  more  than  any  man."  On  June  12th. 
1914.  former  Vice  President  Fairbanks  stood  with 
three  Governors  at  the  grave  of  Lincoln's  mother,  at 
Lincoln  City.  Indiana.  The  three  represented  and 
spoke  for  the  State  of  Lincoln's  birth,  the  State  of 
his  boyhood,  and  the  State  of  his  mature  years. 
There  speaking  for  the  Nation,  Mr.  Fairbanks 
said : — 

"In  these  days  of  anxiety  for  the  future,  it  is  well  to 
recall  the  unwearying  patience,  the  sublime  faith  and  the 
loyalty  of  Abraham  Lincoln  to  the  cause  of  the  Union; 
his  confidence  in  the  virtue  of  the  Republican  Govern- 
ment and  his  trust  in  the  ultimate  judgment  of  the  Ameri- 
can people." 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  UNWRITTEN  CHAPTER  OPENS. 


Note    Now    Where   the   Great    War    Hinged. 

In  a  recent  number  of  the  Saturday  Evening 
Tost.  President  \Voodro\\  Wilson  said: — 

"I  challenge  you  to  cite  me  an  instance  in  all  the  his- 
tory of  the  world  where  liberty  was  handed  down  from 
above.  Liberty  always  is  attained  by  the  forces  working 
below,  underneath,  by  the  great  movement  of  the  people." 


PAGE     NINETEEN 


Truer  words  were  never  uttered.  Every  upward 
movement  comes  from  the  common  people.  Every 
t  Hxhvard  movement  from  the  humble  walks  of  life. 
The  reformer,  as  the  rule,  conies  from  the  humble 
folk  or  rises  from  obscurity.  The  Scriptures  read  : — 

"For  ye  see  your  calling  brethren,  how  that  not  many 
wise  men  after  the  flesh,  not  many  mighty,  not  many 
noble  are  called.  But  God  hath  chosen  the  foolish  things 
of  the  world  to  confound  the  things  which  are  mighty; 
and  base  things  of  the  world,  and  things  which  are  de- 
spised hath  God  chosen;  yea  and  things  which  are  nought 
to  bring  to  nought  things  that  are;  that  no  flesh  should 
glory  in  his  presence." 

The  Godward  movement  of  1863,  in  which  the 
gloom  which  rested  upon  the  country  lifted,  began 
on  the  stricken  hearthstones  of  the  people.  The 
writer  could  not,  if  he  would,  efface  the  memory 
of  the  faltering  prayers  of  the  family  altar,  when 
the  suspense  of  troubled  months  brought  no  word 
from  a  sturdy  soldier  boy,  save  that  he  was  missing ; 
nor  can  he  forget  the  mother  sobs  and  sister  tears 
which  answered  to  these  cryings  of  the  heart.  That 
this  spirit  of  the  Nation  should  seek  a  way  to  utter 
itself  was  but  natural.  Two  conventions  were 
held.  They  were  in  no  wise  related.  The  first  met 
at  Xenia,  Ohio,  on  the  3rd  of  February,  '63,  the  day 
after  the  public  credit  had  reached  its  lowest  ebb. 
The  other  met  at  Sparta,  Illinois,  on  February 
Gth.  The  rod  of  chastening  had  brought  the  Nation 
to  her  senses.  The  convention  at  Sparta  adopted 
a  pledge : — 

"To  labor  to  bring  the  Nation  to  repentance  toward  God, 
and  to  a  faithful  administration  of  the  Government  ac- 
cording to  the  principles  of  the  Word  of  God." 

Two  days  before,  John  Alexander,  a  layman  of 
Xenia,  presented  to  the  convention  in  session  a 
paper  in  which  the  sins  of  the  Nation  were  confess- 


PAGE     TWENTY 


ed,  and  which  insisted  on  repentance  and  reforma- 
tion. A  sentence  of  this  paper  reveals  the  spirit  of 
the  convention : — 

"We  regard  the  neglect  of  God  and  His  law,  by  omitting 
all  acknowledgement  of  them  in  our  Constitution  as  the 
crowning  original  sin  of  the  Nation,  and  slavery  as  one 
of  its  natural  outgrowths." 

The  National  Reform  Association,  organized  at 
Pittsburgh,  January  27th,  '64,  sprang  from  the 
loins  of  this  convention.  There  were  no  historic 
characters  at  it.  The  brilliant  pulpits  were  not  in  ev- 
idence. The  leading  spirits,  John  Alexander,  Rev. 
Samuel  Collins,  Dr.  H.  H.  George,  were  men  of 
the  common  people.  But  their  work  will  endure : — 

"Till  the  stars  grow  old, 

And  the  sun  grows  cold, 

And  the  leaves  of  the  Judgment  book  unfold. 

WHEN   CHRIST   CAME   TO   THE   SENATE. 

It  was  but  a  little  time  until  the  spirit  of  the  Xenia 
convention  had  reached  the  National  Capitol.  Onlv 
26  days  after  a  night  of  fervent  prayer  and  tense 
discussion  at  Xenia,  there  was  such  a  session  of  the 
United  States  Senate,  on  March  2nd,  '63,  as  the 
Recording  Angel  marks.  In  the  night  visions  of 
Daniel,  one  in  white  array  stood  with  uplifted 
hands  upon  the  river.  Even  such  a  one  is  standing 
now  at  the  door  of  the  Senate  chamber.  Had  he 
found  the  spirit  of  the  Senate  like  the  revel  of  Bel- 
shazzar's  lords,  he  would  have  written  on  the  wall. 
But  instead,  to  those  Senators,  broken  in  spirit,  the 
Angel  of  Providence  had  a  message : — 

"Be  it  known  to  you,  0  men,  that  Almighty  God  rules 
in  the  affairs  of  men  and  Nations: — that  no  people  how- 
ever great  in  wealth  or  number  can  prosper  without  His 
favor: — that  'The  Father  judge th  no  man  but  hath  commit- 
ted all  judgment  unto  the  Son  that  all  men  should  honor 
the  Son  even  as  they  honor  the  Father.'  He  stood  before 


PAGE     TWENTY-ONE 


the  Senate  chamber  to  say  of  the  Child  that  was  born,  of 
the  Son  that  was  given: — 'The  Government  shall  be  upon 
His  shoulder.'  'His  name  shall  be  called  Wonderful;'  'His 
dominion  shall  be  from  sea  to  sea.'  'He  must  reign  until 
He  hath  put  all  enemies  under  His  feet.'  'On  His  head 
are  many  crowns;'  'And  on  His  vesture  and  on  His  thigh 
a  name  is  written,  King  of  Kings  and  Lord  of  Lords.'— 
'Be  wise  now,  therefore,  O  ye  Kings;  be  instructed  ye 
Judges  of  the  Earth;'  Hath  not  God  said,  'The  Nation 
«nd  Kingdom  that  will  not  serve  Thee  shall  perish,  yea 
those  Nations  shall  be  utterly  wasted?' ' 

And  that  day  the  Senate  heard.  The  partridge  in 
its  fright  flees  to  the  brake.  In  like  manner  there 
is  an  intuition  in  the  human  soul  which  impels  men 
to  "Flee  as  a  bird  to  their  Mountain/'  As  Hezekiah 
in  dread  of  Sannacherib  shrank  into  the  shelter  of 
Jehovah,  so  did  the  United  States  Senate  and  Abra- 
ham Lincoln  shrink  into  the  shadow  of  Him  whose 
name  is  "above  every  name."  Senator  Harlan,  of 
lo\va,  arose  in  the  Senate  chamber  and  presented 
the  following  resolution.  This  resolution  is  in  keep- 
ing with  the  dignity,  the  high  patriotism,  and  the 
devoted  spirit  of  the  man  who  offered  it : 

THE  HARLAN  RESOLUTION. 

"RESOLVED,  That,  devoutly  recognizing  the  supreme 
authority  and  just  government  of  Almighty  God  in  the 
affairs  of  men  and  of  Nations,  and  sincerely  believing 
that  no  people,  however  great  in  numbers  and  resources 
or  however  strong  in  the  justice  of  their  cause,  can  pros- 
per without  His  favor,  and  at  the  same  time  deploring 
the  National  offenses  which  provoked  His  righteous  judg- 
ment, yet  encouraged,  in  this  day  of  trouble,  by  the  as- 
surance of  His  word,  to  seek  Him  for  succor  according  to 
His  appointed  way,  through  Jesus  Christ,  the  Senate  of 
the  United  States  do  hereby  request  the  President  of  the 
United  States  by  his  proclamation  to  designate  and  set 
apart  a  day  for  National  prayer  and  humiliation,  request- 
ing all  the  people  of  the  land  to  suspend  their  secular 
pursuits  and  unite  in  keeping  the  day  in  solemn  communion 


PAGE     TWENTY-TWO 


with  the  Lord  of  Hosts,  supplicating  Him  to  enlighten 
the  counsels  and  direct  the  policy  of  the  rulers  of  the 
Nations  and  to  support  the  soldiers,  sailors  and  marines, 
and  whole  people  in  the  firm  discharge  of  duty,  until  the 
existing  rebellion  shall  be  overthrown  and  the  blessing  of 
peace  restored  to  our  bleeding  country." 


JUDGE  JAMES  HARLAN  OF  IOWA. 


Author  of  the  Senate  Resolution  "Devoutly  Recognizing" 
the  Supreme  Authority  of  Almighty  God  and  the 
Mediation  of  Jesus  Christ  the  King  of 
Nations. 


CAN  il  be  that  such  a  resolution  passed  in  the 
United  States  Senate?  It  passed  next  day  with  no 
dissenting  voice.  Did  the  Senate  indeed  resolve, 
that.  "Xo  people  however  great  in  numbers  and  re- 


PAGE     TWENTY-THREE 


sources,  or  however  strong  in  the  justice  of  their 
cause  can  prosper  without  the  Divine  favor?"  Did 
the  Senate  say,  "Encouraged  in  this  day  of  trouble 
by  the  assurance  of  His  word  to  seek  Him  for  suc- 
cor in  His  appointed  way,  through  Jesus  Christ?" 
Even  so  the  Senate  said.  What  Senate  so  resolved  ? 
The  Senate  of  the  37th  Congress;  the  greatest  de- 
liberate body  that  ever  sat  in  any  chamber,  clime  or 
country.  Why  say  ye  so?  Well,  pause  and  think. 
How  many  members  of  the  present  Senate  will  have 
a  place  in  history?  Penrose  or  Smoot,  think  you? 
What  Sanhedrim  or  Roman  Senate  or  Parliament 
had  immortals,  even  half  a  score  ?  But  call  the  roll 
of  the  illustrious  Senate  which  so  honored  Christ 
the  Lord.  Judge  James  Harlan  of  Iowa,  Lyman 
Trumbull  of  Illinois,  Henry  S.  Lane  of  Indiana, 
Zachariah  Chandler  of  Michigan,  Benjamin  F. 
Wade  and  John  Sherman  of  Ohio,  David  Wilmot  of 
Pennsylvania,  Charles  Sumner  of  Massachusetts, 
assaulted  in  the  Senate  chamber  May  22,  '56 ;  Henry 
Wilson  and  John  P.  Hale  of  Vermont,  the  same 
Hale  who  carried  his  State  against  slavery  by  the 
"Hale  storm"  of  1845 ;  William  Pitt  Fessenden  of 
Maine,  and  Lot  M.  Morrill  elected  to  fill  the  seat 
which  Hannibal  Hamlin  left  vacant  when  made  Vice 
President ;  and  Hamlin  presiding  over  all.  When  in 
the  world's  eventful  history  sat  any  body  with  so 
many  immortal  names  ?  Never  in  human  history  was 
Jesus  the  King  so  honored  as  when  this  Senate  set 
Him  forth  in  the  sight  of  all  Nations  of  the  Earth 
as  the  Mediator  between  our  Nation  and  our  Na- 
tion's God. 


PAGE     TWENTY-FOUR 


CHAPTER  VL 


THE    MAN    AND    SENATE, 


Abraham   Lincoln's   full   Concurrence. 

Could  Abraham  Lincoln,  whom  some  say  was  a 
Deist,  approve  of  such  a  resolution?  Here  is  the 
man  and  here  is  his  proclamation.  Let  him  speak 
for  himself: — 


"WHEREAS,  The  Senate  of  the  United  States,  devoutly 
recognizing  the  supreme  authority  and  just  government 
of  Almighty  God  in  all  the  affairs  of  men  and  Nations, 
has  by  a  resolution  requested  the  President  to  designate 
and  set  apart  a  day  for  National  prayer  and  humiliation, 
and  whereas,  it  is  the  duty  of  Nations  as  well  as  of  men  to 
own  their  dependence  upon  the  overruling  power  of  God, 
to  confess  their  sins  and  transgressions  in  humble  sor- 
row, yet  with  assured  hope  that  genuine  repentance  will 
lead  to  mercy  and  pardon,  and  to  recognize  the  sublime 
truth  announced  in  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  proven  by 


PAGE    TWENTY- FIVE 


all   history,   that  those   Nations   only   are  blessed   whose 
"God  is  the  Lord. 

And,  insomuch  as  we  know  that  by  His  divine  law 
'nations,  like  individuals,  are  subjected  to  punishments  and 
chastisements  in  this  world,  may  we  not  justly  fear 
that  the  awful  calamity  of  civil  war  which  now  desolates 
the  land  may  be  but  a  punishment  inflicted  upon  us  for 
our  presumptuous  sins,  to  the  needful  end  of  our  National 
•reformation  as  a  whole  people? 

We  have  been  the  recipents  of  the  choicest  bounties  of 
heaven;  we  have  been  preserved  these  many  years  in  peace 
and  prosperity;  we  have  grown  in  numbers,  wealth  and 
power  as  no  other  Nation  has  ever  grown.  But  we  have 
forgotten  God.  We  have  forgotten  the  gracious  hand 
which  preserved  us  in  peace  and  multiplied  and  en- 
riched and  strengthened  us,  and  we  have  vainly  imagined, 
in  the  deceitfulness  of  our  hearts,  that  all  these  blessings 
were  produced  by  some  superior  wisdom  and  virtue  of 
our  own.  Intoxicated  with  unbroken  success  we  have 
become  too  self-sufficient  to  feel  the  necessity  of  redeeming 
and  preserving  grace,  too  proud  to  pray  to  the  God  that 
made  us. 

It  behooves  us,  then,  to  humble  ourselves  before  the  of- 
fended power,  to  confess  our  National  sins,  and  to  pray 
for  clemency  and  forgiveness.  Now,  therefore,  in  com- 
pliance with  the  request,  and  fully  concurring  in  the  views 
of  the  Senate,  I  do  by  this  my  proclamation  designate  and 
set  apart  Thursday,  the  30th  day  of  April,  1863,  as  a  day 
of  National  humiliation,  fasting  and  prayer.  And  I  do 
hereby  request  all  the  people  to  abstain  on  that  day 
from  their  ordinary  secular  pursuits,  and  to  unite  in  their 
-•ioveral  places  of  public  worship  and  their  respective 
homes  in  keeping  the  day  holy  to  the  Lord  and  devoted  to 
the  humble  discharge  of  the  religious  duties  proper  to  that 
solemn  occasion. 

All  this  being  done  in  sincerity  and  truth,  let  us  then 
rest  humbly  in  the  hope  authorized  by  the  divine  teach- 
ings that  the  united  cry  of  the  Nation  will  be  heard  on 
high  and  answered  with  blessings  no  less  than  the  pardon 
of  our  National  sins  and  the  restoration  of  our  now  divided 
and  suffering  country  to  its  former  happy  condition  of 
unity  and  peace. 


PAGE     TWENTY-SIX 


In  Witness  whereof,  I  have  hereunto  set  my  hand  and 
caused  the  seal  of  the  United  States  to  be  affixed. 

Done  at  the  city  of  Washington,  this  30th  day  of  March, 
A.  D.  1863,  and  of  the  Independence  of  the  United  States 
the  eighty-seventh. 

By  the  President,  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 

WILLIAM  H.  SEWARD,  Secretary  of  State." 

The  most  sublime,  and  certainly  the  most  pathetic 
thing  in  the  annals  of  our  Republic,  was  Abraham 
Lincoln,  sitting  amid  the  Nation's  woes  with  the 
resolution  of  the  Senate  before  him,  and  with  the 
sad  and  sallow  face  which  bespoke  the  "Man  of 
Sorrows,"  writing: — 

"It  is  the  duty  of  nations  as  well  as  men  to  own  their 
dependence  upon  the  overruling  power  of  God,  to  confess 

their  sins  in  humble  sorrow,  and  to  recognize  the 

sublime  truth  announced  in  Holy  Scripture  and  proven 
by  all  history,  that  only  those  nations  are  blessed  whose 
God  is  the  Lord:" —  "It  behooves  us,  then,  to  humble  our- 
selves before  the  offended  Power,  to  confess  our  National 
sins  and  to  pray  for  clemency  and  forgiveness."  "Now, 
therefore,  in  compliance  with  the  request  and  fully  con- 
curring in  the  views  of  the  Senate,  I  do  by  this  my  pro- 
clamation, &c." 

Was  this  proclamation  a  mere  form  ?  O,  no,  no ! 
Look  at  the  tenor  of  it.  Such  words  could  only 
come  from  a  heart  broken  and  contrite.  Amid  the 
chastening  of  the  Nation  the  President  had  become 
a  man  of  prayer.  But  the  last  test  of  sincerity  is  to 
obey. 

"Behold  to  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice."  Will  the 
President  and  Senate  and  the  Nation  now  obey? 
Slavery  was  the  sin  of  the  Nation.  It  was  a  "Throne 
of  iniquity"  in  which  all  other  evils  centered.  Up 
till  this  hour  Emancipation  was  only  a  "war  meas- 
ure." It  did  not  apply  to  slave  States  not  in  rebel- 
lion, nor  to  such  counties  or  parishes  of  the  Seces- 


PAGE    TWENTY-SEVEN 


sion  States  as  had  yielded  to  our  arms.  It  left  thou- 
sands of  negroes  in  slavery.  It  rested  on  mere  ex- 
pediency. It  had  no  regard  for  "Thus  saith  the 
Lord."  To  hold  slaves  was  still  the  privilege  of 
thousands. 

But  now  a  resolution  was  offered  in  the  House, 
It  made  the  holding  of  men  in  involuntary  servitude 
to  be  a  crime.  It  was  in  harmony  with  the  eternal 
fitness  of  things,  that  Owen  Lovejoy,  who  more  than 
25  years  before  had  witnessed  the  martyrdom  of  his 
brother  Elijah  for  his  Abolition  principles,  should 
now  stand  sponsor  for  the  resolution  which  abol- 
ished slavery.  This  resolution  which  made  an  ever- 
lasting end  of  involuntary  servitude  save  as  a  pen- 
alty for  crime,  was  adopted  by  the  Senate  on  June 
9th,  1863;  concurred  in  by  the  House  on  June  17th, 
and  signed  by  the  President  on  June  19th.  This 
resolution  set  the  Nation  right  with  God.  A  penitent 
Republic  had  laid  itself  low  before  the  throne  of 
Him  whose  name  is  "above  every  name." 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  UNSEEN  HAND. 

The  Signal  for  the  Turning  of  the  Tide. 

Skepticism  is  wont  to  say,  "What  profit  is  it  that 
we  have  kept  his  ordinances?"  But  the  events  of  '63 
silenced  all  unbelief.  So  far  as  the  writer's  investi- 
gation goes,  not  one  paper  North  or  South  mur- 
mured at  the  Senate's  resolution,  or  at  Lincoln's 
proclamation.  The  people's  fast  was  a  signal  for 
theturningof  thetide.  The  unseen  hand  wrote  in  that 
hour  the  doom  of  the  great  rebellion  as  plainly  as 
the  hand  that  wrote  "TEKEL"  upon  Belshazzar's 
wall. 


PAGE     TWENTY-EIGHT 


Two  great  issues  hung  in  suspense  upon  the  hour : 
Human  Slavery  and  the.  Federal  Union.  Thirty- 
three  years  before,  in  his  reply  ta  Hayne,  Daniel 
Webster  linked  these  issues  in  the  memorable  words, 

"Liberty  and  uiiirm,  now  and  forever,  one  and  insepar- 
able," 

Abraham  Lincoln  said  at  the  dedication  of  the 
cemetery  at  Gettysburg  on  November  19,  '63 ;  with 
graves  of  3600  heroic  dead  around  him,  of  which 
more  than  a  third  were  marked  unknown : 

"Four  score  and  seven  years  ago  our  fathers  brought, 
forth  on  this  continent  a  new  nation,  conceived  in  liberty 
and  dedicated  to  the  proposition  that  all  men  are  created 
equal.  Now  we  are  engaged  in  a  great  civil  war,  testing; 
whether  that  Nation  or  any  other  Nation  so  conceived  and 
so  dedicated  can  long  endure." 

Chief  Justice  Joseph  Story,  who  had  been  sleep- 
ing with  his  fathers  for  18  years  before  Lincoln 
uttered  these  words,  had  said  :— 

"We  stand  the  latest  and  if  we  fail  probably  the 
last  experiment  of  self-government  by  the  people." 

If  the  Union  endure,  tyranny  must  die.  If  slavery 
fall  on  American  soil,  that  age  old  system  must  per- 
ish everywhere.  This  was  the  great  stake  when  the 
Senate  of  '63  and  Abraham  Lincoln  carried  up 
their  cause;  as  did  Hezekiah  and  the  elders.  And 
now,  ''Behold  what  God  wrought.'' 

Amid  darkness  as  deep  as  ever  brooded  over  a 
nation,  John  Alexander,  Samuel  Collins,  H.  H. 
George,  and  the  Xenia  convention,  on  February  3rd. 
'63,  prayed  and  deliberated  over  a  national  recogni- 
tion of  Christ  the  King  until  deep  midnight.  On 
March  2nd  the  Senate  adopted  the  Harlan  resolu- 
tion. On  March  30th  Abraham  Lincoln  issued  his 
proclamation  of  a  fast.  On  April  30th  the  people 
held  "solemn  communion  with  the  Lord  of  Hosts." 


PAGE    TWENTY-NINE 


On  June  19th  the  President  put  his  name  to  the  bill 
Avhich  made  an  end  of  slavery.  Then  followed  a  lit- 
tle period  of  dense  darkness.  Of  it  Horace  Greeley 
wrote,  "The  ten  days  which  preceded  the  battle  of 
Gettysburg  were  the  darkest  in  our  history."  But 
it  was  the  darkness  before  a  womlrous  dawn. 

THE  ^IDE  OF  WAR  TURNS. 

Now  mark  the  swift  turning  of  the  tide.  On 
Thursday  the  people  fasted.  That  Saturday  night 
Stonewall  Jackson,  worth  more  to  Lee's  army  than 
a  score  of  regiments,  the  man  as  Wendling  viewed 
it  on  whom  the  whole  war  turned,  was  mortally 
wounded  at  Chancellorsville.  Chancellorville  was 
less  a  disaster  than  a  providence,  because  that  bat- 
tle prompted  Lee's  invasion  of  the  North.  Thus  was 
it  ordered  that  one  of  the  most  memorable  battles 
for  human  freedom  in  all  time  should  be  fought  on 
the  soil  of  a  loyal  State;  that  her's  should  be  the 
monumented  field,  the  hallowed  graves,  the  priceless 
memorials.  In  two  brief  months  after  the  people's 
fast — in  two  brief  wreeks  from  the  hour  when  the 
signature  of  Lincoln  made  an  end  of  slavery- 
Gettysburg  was  fought  and  Vicksburg  fell.  The 
Mississippi  was  flowing  "unf retted  to  the  sea."  With 
the  loss  of  the  fourth  of  his  army,  with  a  wagon 
train  of  wounded  17  miles  in  length.  Lee  in  a  pitiless 
rain  was  retreating  to  the  Potomac.  As  the  great 
news  flashed  over  the  land  the  gloom  lifted.  The 
bells  pealed.  The  cannon  thundered.  The  glad  ban- 
ners waved.  Amid  the  loyal  rejoicing  the  intrigue 
of  Napoleon  ended.  The  danger  of  foreign 
intervention  had  vanished.  And  the  hope  of  the  Con- 
federacy died.  Napoleon  had  held  back  intervention 
until  Maximillian  could  be  crowned.  The  fall  of 
Vicksburg  and  victory  at  Gettysburg  seven  days  be- 


PAGE    THIRTY 


fore  the  coronation  ruined  his  program. 

But  are  we  to  conclude  that  the  life  of  the  Nation, 
and  the  fortunes  of  the  great  Civil  War  hinged  upon 
a  National  recognition  of  Almighty  God  as  supreme 
in  the  affairs  of  men  and  nations?  And  did  the  sav- 
ing of  the  Nation  turn  upon  her  seeking  Him  for 
succor  in  His  appointed  way  through  Jesus  Christ? 
Abraham  Lincoln  has  settled  that.  Only  12  days 
after  Vicksburg  fell  and  Gettysburg  was  won,  he 
proclaimed  a  great  thanksgiving  day.  The  instru- 
ment was  dated  July  15.  The  day  observed  was 
August  6th.  In  his  proclamation  the  Great  Common- 
er said : — 

"It  has  pleased  Almighty  God  to  hearken  to  the  suppli- 
cations and  prayers  of  an  afflicted  people  and  to  vouchsafe 
to  the  army  and  the  navy  of  the  United  States  victories 
on  land  and  sea  so  signal  and  so  effective  as  to  furnish 
reasonable  grounds  for  augmented  confidence  that  the 
Union  of  these  States  will  be  maintained,  their  Constitu- 
tion preserved,  and  their  peace  and  prosperity  permanently 
restored." 

"Thou,  too,  sail  on,  O  ship  of  State! 

Sail  on,  0  Union,  strong  and  great! 

Humanity  with  all  its  fears, 

With  all  its  hopes  of  future  fears, 

Is  hanging  breathless  on  thy  fate." 

"Sail  on  nor  fear  to  breast  the  sea, 
Our  hearts,  our  hopes,  are  all  with  thee. 
Our  hearts,  our  hopes,  our  prayers,  our  tears, 
Our  faith  triumphant  o'er  our  fears 
Are  all  with  thee- — are  all  with  thee." 

— H.  W.  Longfellow. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 
THE   LOST  OPPORTUNITY. 


Lone  Watchmen  on  the  Mount  of  Vision. 

When  James  Harlan  and  Abraham  Lincoln  and 


PAGE     THIKTY-ONE 


the  Senate  of  '63  made  humble  acknowledgement  of 
Almighty  God  as  supreme  in  the  affairs  of  men  and 
nations,  and  when  amid  the  perils  of  the  Nation  they 
led  the  people  "to  seek  Him  for  succor  in  His  ap- 
pointed way  through  Jesus  Christ" — when  they 
made  humble  confession  of  the  National  offences 
and  in  token  of  their  sincerity  blotted  out  the  sin  of 
slavery — they  came  within  but  a  little  of  enthroning 
Him  among  the  people  whose  name  is  called  Won- 
derful. O  why  did  not  men  rise  up  in  that  hour  and 
make  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  supreme,  and  write  it 
in  their  fundamental  law !  How  everything  was  ripe 
for  such  a  movement!  How  all  things  argued  that 
Christian  men  should  act!  The  people  were  chasten- 
ed in  spirit  and  ready.  The  Senate  with  no  dissent- 
ing voice  had  made  humble  confession  of  Almighty 
God,  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  and  of  Jesus  Christ  as 
the  Nation's  appointed  way  of  reaching  God  for 
succor.  Abraham  Lincoln  in  the  sight  of  all  the  Na- 
tions of  the  earth  had  proclaimed  his  full  concur- 
rence in  the  views  of  the  Senate.  Infidelity,  atheism, 
and  every  other  opponent  of  Christ  the  King,  was 
awed  into  silence,  while  a  smitten  people  looked  to 
the  one  and  only  Mediator  between  God  and  the 
Nation.  The  President  and  Congress  had  taken 
such  action  as  to  slavejy  as  honored  the  Great  Crea- 
tor who  had  made  of  one  blood  all  them  that  dwell 
on  the  earth.  Great  victories,  which  had  turned  the 
tide  of  war,  had  followed  the  honoring  of  Almighty 
God  and  the  recognition  of  His  Son  as  Christ  and 
Mediator.  Abraham  Lincoln  in  a  National  proclama- 
tion when  the  Nation  was  wild  with  joy.  had  ascrib- 
ed our  victories  to  the  hearer  of  prayer  from  whom 
had  come  deliverance.  "There  is  a  tide  in  the  affairs 
of  men  which  taken  at  the  flood  leads  on  to  fortune." 


PAGE     THIRTY-TWO 


What  an  hour  to  strike  for  Christ  and  His  crown 
rights!  How  could  men  miss  such  an  opportunity! 
We  cannot  but  wonder  at  the  stupidity  of  those  who 
call  themselves  the  soldiers  of  the  cross.  Not  long 
ago  a  distinguished  Hebrew  scholar  said,  "The 
preachers  of  today  seem  to  know  all  about  the  Bible, 
save  how  to  apply  it."  Prophets  are  many.  The 
seers  are  few.  These  stupid  Christian  men  were  the 
same  who  had  voted  for  slavery  and  with  the  parties 
which  for  years  had  catered  to  and  upheld  that  "sum 
of  villainies."  Now,  in  their  blindness,  they  let  their 
great  hour  pass.  These  are  the  stupid  figures  of  a 
formal  church,  who  nine  years  later  let  the  party 
of  Abraham  Lincoln,  which  he  had  led  so  near  to  the 
Kingdom,  sell  itself  by  covenant  to  the  brewers,  with 
not  a  word  of  protest.  These  are  the  stupid  fathers 
of  the  recreant  sons  of  the  church  of  today,  who 
follow  their  fathers  in  blindness  or  perfidy,  while 
the  Prince  of  Darkness  votes  them  like  sheep  for 
the  traffic  in  strong  drink.  What  a  marvel  in  these 
years  of  the  20th  century,  that  lusty  throated  men 
who  have  been,  singing  the  rousing  hymn  of  Per- 
ronet.  "All  hail  the  power  of  Jesus'  name,"  for 
nearly  seven  score  years,  have  not  the  shadow  of  a 
plan  for  the  enthronement  of  Jesus  in  the  Nation! 
Two  classes  only  have  a  clear  cut  program  for  the 
enthronement  of  the  King.  One  class  is  large,  well 
learned,  well  booked  and  titled.  It  has  a  taking 
plan.  Its  plan  is  to  let  the  King  of  Nations  come 
and  crown  Himself.  The  other  class  comprises  a 
few  lone  and  scattered  watchmen. 

THE  MOUNT  OF  VISION. 

\Vho  are  these  lone  and  scattered  watchmen  on 
the  Mount  of  Vision?  Who  are  the  men  who  have  a 
plan  for  the  enthronement  of  the  King?  Who  are 


PAGE    THIRTY-THREE 


the  men  who  50  years  ago  saw  what  ,might  have 
been?  They  are  John  Alexander,  David  McAllister, 
Samuel  Collins,  T.  P.  Stevenson,  A.  M.  Milligan, 
J.  H.  Mcllvaine,  H.  H.  George,  J.  R.  W.  Sloan,  and 
such  as  these.  These  are  the  men  who  had  a  plan 
for  recognizing  Jesus  the  Son  of  David  as  King 
of  the  Nation.  They  have  left  it  as  a  heritage  to 
their  children.  Their  plan  is  to  impress  upon  the 
Nation  the  fact  that  "All  rule  and  all  Authority" 
has  been  committed  to  the  Son  of  God,  and  that  He 
must  reign  : — that  we  the1  people  "do  ordain  and  es- 
tablish" and  "provide"  and  "secure,"  but  subject  to 
His  supreme  Authority — that  His  kingly  rights  and 
claims  must  be  recognized  in  the  fundamental  law 
of  our  Republic;  and  that  in  the  enactment  and 
enforcement  of  laws,  reverent  regard  must  be  had  to 
His  royal  prerogative.  To  give  effect  to  this  lofty 
purpose  there  must  be  a  political  party  of  high  char- 
acter which  will  make  these  principles  a  part  of  her 
platform  and  pledge  herself  to  make  them  Constitu- 
tion and  law.  As  slavery  could  not  exist  in  any  Na- 
tion worthy  of  the  name  when  once  the  United 
States  had  abolished  it,  just  so  no  Nation  can  long 
refuse  to  own  the  King  of  Nations  when  once  our 
Nation  has  owned  His  supreme  Authority  in  her 
fundamental  law.  The  plan  is  to  awaken  the  Nation 
to  a  sense  of  her  high  destiny. 

HOT  FOR  THE  FORGE. 

These  scattered  watchmen  held  a  convention  in 
Pittsburgh  on  January  27,  1864.  They  struck  when 
the  iron  was  ready  for  the  forge.  The  convention 
cftd  three  things.  It  organized  the  National  Re- 
form Association  which  is  the  vital  center  of  the 
greatest  political  movement  on  earth.  It  adopted 
and  addressed  a  memorial  to  the  United  States 


PAGE     THIRTY-FOU.R 


Congress.  It  sent  a  committee  of  21  to  the  White 
House  to  ask  Abraham  Lincoln  to  commend  to» 
Congress  action  that  would  make  permanent  such, 
a  recognition  of  the  Nation's  Supreme  Ruler  and 
Mediator  as  the  Senate  and  the  President  load  al- 
ready made.  The  chairman  of  the  committee  was 
J.  H.  Mcllvaine,  pastor  at  the  time  of  High  street 
ehurch  of  Newark,  N.  J.  The  committee  called  upon 
the  President  on  February  10.  It  stood  in  a  semicir- 
cle before  him.  The  chairman's  address  was  brief, 
but  most  fit  and  masterful.  It  set  forth  the  object 
of  their  Association  and  made  its  appeal  to  the 
President.  Abraham  Lincoln  listened  with  profound 
attention.  His  reply  to  the  committee,  as  rememl^er- 
ed  and  reported  by  H.  H.  George,  one  of  its  mem- 
bers, was  •; — • 

"Gentlemen,  you  have  come  here  on  a  great  errand.  We 
are  going  through  a  terrible  war  to  secure  the  rights  of 
men.  The  next  step  will  be  to  acknowledge  the  rights  of 
God.  And  I,  as  soon  as  I  see  my  way  clear,  will  recom- 
mend the  same  to  Congress." 

What  an  hour!    What  an  opportunity!    Where 
now  were  the  ten  thousand  times  ten  thousand  who 
have  been  singing,  "All  hail  the  power  of  Jesus' 
name  ?"    Where  were  the  multitudes  which  for  four 
score  years  had  been  shouting,  "Bring  forth  the  roy- 
al Diadem?"  How  was  it  that  when  the  Senate  with 
no  dissenting  voice  voted  its  devout  recognition  of 
the  Nation's  Mediator: — that  when  the  President 
proclaimed  his  humble  concurrence  with  its  views — 
that  when  the  mouth  of  infidelity  was  stopped — 
that  when  Vicksburg  fell  and  Gettysburg  was  won — 
that  when  the  thrill  of  band  and  boom  of  cannon 
and  revel  of  banner  and  glad  hand  clap  and  the 
tear-gush  of  joy  blent  in  the  Nation's  rejoicing — 
that  when  Abraham  Lincoln  stood  reverently  forth 


PAGE     THIRTY-FIVE 


to  proclaim  that,  "It  has  pleased  Almighty  God  to 
hearken  to  the  supplications  and  prayers  of  an 
afflicted  people" — that  there  was  no  great  movemeent 
in  the  interests  of  Emanuel's  crown?  O  why  was  it 
that  only  a  little  remnant  rose  to  the  hour?  What 
fatuity!  What  an  hour  that  would  have  been  to 
"Bring  forth  the  royal  diadem!"  When  Johnson  had 
taken  up  a  strong  position  behind  the  mountains  at 
Dalton,  Sherman  ordered  McPherson  to  march  by 
way  of  Snake  Creek  valley,  Ship's  Gap,  and  the 
forest  screened  roads  of  Villanow  and  strike  the 
Confederate  rear.  Had  McPherson  moved  as 
swift  and  struck  as  hard  as  Jackson  would  have 
done,  little  would  have  been  left  for  Johnson  but 
surrender.  Sherman  was  vexed  at  the  brave  man's 
failure,  but  only  said,  "General,  a  great  opportuni- 
ty only  comes  once  in  a  lifetime."  And  it  would 
seem  that  the  very  angels  must  have  heaved  a  sigh 
in  some  such  words  when  the  Ransomed  of  the  Lord 
in  America  failed  to  rise  to  their  hour. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

SOME  BRIEF  ADENDA. 


A  Chapter  in  Fragments. 

It  has  often  been  rufully  said  that  Abraham 
Lincoln  never  made  any  confession  of  Christ.  But 
what  man  in  1800  years  has  made  a  confession 
which  so  honored  the  world's  Redeemer  as  when 
Abraham  Lincoln  with  the  resolution  of  the  Senate 
before  him,  and  with  the  eyes  of  all  the  earth  upon 
him,  sent  forth  in  proclamation  the  words : — 

"It  is  the  duty  of  Nations  to  recognize  the  sublime  truth, 
announced  in  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  proven  by  all  his- 
tory, that  only  those  Nations  are  blessed  whose  God  is 
the  Lord." 


PAGE      THIRTY-SIX 


The  great  and  grave  issue  of  the  Great  Civil 
War  was,  neither  the  Union  nor  Slavery,  but  wheth- 
er the  American  Republic  would  own  her  Lord  and 
King.  It  is  written,  "That  nation  and  that  king- 
dom which  will  not  serve  thee  shall  perish,  yea, 
those  nations  shall  be  utterly  wasted.  Here  was 
the  issue  upon  which  the  Great  Civil  war  hinged. 
Had  some  Senator  rose  in  his  place  and  voted  to 
strike  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  out  of  the  Harlan 
resolution;  had  the  Senate  voted  for  such  an  in- 
dignity; had  Abraham  Lincoln  written  over  such 
act  of  perfidy,  "Fully  concurring  in  the  views  of 
the  Senate,"  the  London  Times  would  have  had  her 
wish,  and  Fredericksburg  would  have  been  "A 
memorable  day  for  the  future  historian  of  the  de- 
cline and  fall  of  the  American  Republic." 

HC  >K  >K  Jfc  5J5  % 

The  editor  of  the  Venango  Vindicator  once  wrote 
of  the  proposed  honoring  of  Christ  the  King  of 
Nations  in  the  Prohibition  platform  and  in  the 
Federal  Constitution,  "It  would  raise  many  grave 
questions."  And  again  he  wrote,  "We  believe  the 
proposition  to  be  out  of  harmony  with  that  religious 
liberty  for  which  we  have  so  long  and  so  often 
thanked  God."  But  when  the  illustrious  Senate  of 
'63  and  Abraham  Lincoln  so  honored  Jesus  Christ 
in  public  proclamation,  the  lions  which  the  objector 
saw  in  the  way  proved  not  to  be  real  lions,  but  only 
tethered  scare-crows  at  which  men  balk.  When  the 
Senate  by  resolution  said,  "Yet  encouraged  in  this 
day  of  trouble  by  the  assurance  of  His  word,  to 
seek  Him  for  succor  in  His  appointed  way,  through 
Jesus  Christ;"  and  when  Abraham  Lincoln  pro- 
claimed, "Fully  concurring  in  the  views  of  the  Sen- 
ate;" and  when  God  in  His  Almighty  providence 


PAGE     THIRTY-SEVEN 


set  His  seal  by  signal  victories  upon  their  deed,  then 
was  every  infidel  and  Jew  and  atheist  in  all  the 
land  awed  into  silence.  To  honor  Jesus  Christ,  as 
the  Senate  of  Hale  and  Harlan  and  Sumner  did, 
has  ever  been  a  grave  question  in  any  nation.  But 
to  refuse  to  own  Him  has  been  the  grave  question 
for  many  a  party,  State  and  throne. 

To  many,  the  kingdom  of  Jesus  is  an  ethereal 
thing,  a  sort  of  hazy  sentimentalism.  It  goes  well  in 
sacred  song.  It  sounds  natural  in  prayer.  It  is  a 
taking  sentiment  for  pulpit.  "In  God  we  trust," 
will  even  pass  on  coin.  But  to  declare  for  Christ's 
crown  rights  in  a  party  platform,  to  uphold  His 
scepter  at  the  polls,  to  move  to  own  His  authority 
in  the  fundamental  law,  is  another  matter.  The  ob- 
jector quotes,  "My  kingdom  is  not  of  this 
world."  "The  kingdom  is  within  you."  Even 
so  the  kingdom  is  from  above  and  is  within.  And 
so  is  patriotism.  But  heaven  pity  your  patriotism, 
if  it  does  not  voice  itself  on  election  day,  plead  the 
cause  of  the  public  weal  at  the  ballot  box,  or  should- 
er a  musket  or  give  up  a  first-born  in  the  hour  of 
your  country's  peril!  And  God  pity  your  sickly 
fealty  to  your  Lord  and  King,  if  it  do  not  move 
you  to  honor  Him  in  your  party  platform  and  bear 
his  name  upon  your  heart  within  the  polling  booth ! 
****** 

The  Drink  Problem  is  the  grayest  problem  which 
ever  confronted  the  American  people.  The  Rum 
Power  is  one  of  the  most  gigantic  conspiracies 
which  ever  reared  its  crested  head  against  the 
Christ  of  Nations.  The  debauchee,  the  dead  and 
dreary  churchman,  the  mammon  server,  the  Sab- 
bath hater,  the  white  slaver,  the  political  corrupter 


PAGE    THIRTY-EIGHT 


are  all  in  the  conspiracy.  It  runs  the  country.  It 
controls  the  license  parties.  It  has  neutralized  the 
church.  It  is  the  overshadowing  curse  of  the  Nation. 
Slavery  had  to  be  overthroAvn  to  save  the  Federal 
Union.  Leave  the  Rum  Power  go  on  and  it  will 
destroy  the  Republic.  We  have  serious  work  ahead. 
And  be  it  known  to  all  men,  that  since  Abraham 
Lincoln  and  the  great  Congress  of  '63  could  make 
no  progress  in  saving  the  Union,  or  in  solving  the 
problem  of  slavery,  until  a  humble  confession  was 
made  of  Him  who  is  called  ''Wonderful/'  that  so 
will  it  be  again.  We  shall  never  solve  the  Drink 
problem  or  overthrow  the  Rum  Power  until  we 
humbly  confess  and  devoutly  honor  Him  on  whom 
Almighty  God  Jias  laid  "Honor  and  Majesty. 


Printed  from  the  Job  Room*  of 

BUTLER  PUBLISHING  CO. 

Publishers  of 
ehr  (Clran  (Tnmmmuuraltlj 


Pamphlet 

Binder 
Gaylord  Bros. 

Makers 
Syracuse,  N.  Y. 

PAT.  JAN  21,  1908 


?•:.>•••••'.-  •'•-•"•  .« 
fc'T.,   •..•..,:. 

W;^: 

m^:- 


UNIVERSITY  OF  ILLINOIS-URBANA 

973  7L63B4H97E  COOS 

THE  EVENT  ON  WHICH  THE  GREAT  CIVIL  WAR  H 


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